Isaac and Abimelech

Genesis 26

This chapter in Isaac’s life holds many parallels to Abraham’s time spent in Gerar, near King Abimelech. Like his father, Isaac lies about his relationship with Rebekah, claiming her as his sister. King Abimelech finds out, and orders that no harm shall come to him, despite his lies. Isaac continues to be blessed by God, and becomes very wealthy (isn’t he already wealthy as the sole heir to Abraham’s wealth?). The Philistines once again fill in all the wells that his father’s servants had dug during the time of Abraham. Isaac is definitely walking in his father’s footsteps. The parallels and dualities are uncanny, and could imply an ancient scholar who split one mythological tale into two separate components.

This chapter mainly consists of:

·      Another famine. However, in this instance, Isaac is specifically requested by God not to go to Egypt, as his father had done during a time of famine.

·      A reiteration of the Abrahamic Covenant from God (Gen 26:3 “For to you and your descendants I will give all these lands and will confirm the oath I swore to your father Abraham.”

·      Repetition of Abraham’s wrongdoing (Gen 26:7 When the men of that place asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” because he was afraid to say, “She is my wife.”

·      The Philistines fill the wells that were dug by Abraham’s servants. This also occurred in Genesis 21.

·      King Abimelech asks Isaac to move away, as he has become too powerful.

·      Isaac digs some more wells, and is opposed by other herdsman in the area.

·      Isaac receives a visit from King Abimelech at his new location, near his new well, and they sign a treaty together.

The moral of this passage seen through the eyes of religious Christians is that a person can choose to live by principle or providence. Walking by providence, as Issac did at the beginning, means a person will still arrive where God wants us to be, but without the joy of being an active participant. Living by principle, means walking joyfully, with God….to the same location.

According to the Jewish Midrash (Bereishit Rabba 64:3) this passage explains that an offering to God must stay in the temple courtyard. Thus, because Isaac was an offering to God—remember the whole sacrifice thing back in Genesis 22—he must stay within the boundaries of the Promised Land.

That still sounds quite a bit like pre-destination to me.

Is this the same King Abimelech?

The jury seems to be out on whether or not the King Abimelech in Genesis 26 is the same Abimelech found in Genesis 20 and 21. Judaism is known for its endless amount of midrash, or commentary, on the Bible and Jewish laws. In the case of Abimelech, even early scholars found the Abimelech dilemma compelling.

Esau’s Wives

At the very end of this chapter, we find out that Esau committed the sin of marrying two women. The polygamous relationship does not seem to be the focal point of his sin; rather, it is the ethnicity of his wives. They are both Hittite. And, according to Genesis 26:35, They were a source of grief to Isaac and Rebekah.

We will be taking a closer look at Esau’s wives shortly.

Isaac's dysfunctional family

Genesis 25

Genesis 25 begins with another round of genealogy, in regards to the children Abraham has with a new wife, Keturah, who is also referred to as a concubine in this same chapter. It really has me wondering who Keturah is, this woman who is barely mentioned in the Bible, but manages to occupy the role of both concubine and wife to the same man.

Keturah is described by many rabbis as being a woman of virtue. In Judaism, it is explained that the name “Keturah” is based on her acts, which were “pleasant like frankincense”. Some rabbinical scholars hold the belief that Keturah and Hagar are the same person. http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/9293-keturah

Abraham did not treat Hagar and Ishmael very well. Likewise, he sends all of Keturah’s children away so that they would not live in the same vicinity of his precious son, Issac, who inherited everything. Abraham wants Isaac to be considered his rightful heir without being threatened by any of his half-brothers. This favoritism is apparently okay in the Abraham family tree.

The descendents of one of Abraham’s sons by Keturah, Midian, will feature in later stories. Joseph was sold by his brother to the Midianites, and the Israelites will attack the town of Midian in later years. There is no archaeological or historical record for a Midian tribe, all anecdotes in regards to Midianites comes from the Torah and Qur’an.

At the time of Abraham’s death, Isaac lived near Beer-Lahai-Roi. This is the same well where God found Hagar after she fled into the desert.

We learn the names of Ishmael’s twelve sons, who will supposedly become the twelve tribal rulers that God proclaimed they would be. There is a very different translation in the NIV compared to the JPS Torah to describe Ismael’s sons.

Genesis 25: 17-18, NIV Altogether, Ishmael lived 137 years. He breathed his last and died, and he was gathered to his people. His descendents settled in the are from Havilah to Shur, near the border of Egypt, as you go toward Asshur. And they lived in hostility toward all their brothers.

Genesis 25:17-18, JPS These were the years of the life of Ishmael: 137 years; then he breathed his last and died, and was gathered to his kin. They dwelt from Havilah, by Shur, which is close to Egypt, all the way to Asshur; they camped alongside their kinsmen.

Why is this important? Because today’s Jewish people are supposedly the descendants of Isaac, just like today’s Arab Muslims are supposedly the descendants of Ishmael. And, some people on this planet like to claim that these two ethnic groups will always be at war with each other, because the Bible says so. The Christian Bible is the book that uses the word hostility, while the Torah makes no such implication. Take, for example, this earlier verse:

Genesis 16:12, NIV “He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.”

Genesis 16:12, JPS “He shall be a wild ass of a man; His hand against everyone, and everyone’s hand against him; he shall dwell alongside all of his kinsmen.”

Granted, in both translations, Ishmael is not portrayed as the nicest of folks, and is very different from the Ishmael found in the Qu’ran. But, it is only the Christian Bible that claims he and his descendants will be hostile towards their extended family.

Rebekah was from Northwest Mesopotamia, Abraham’s place of birth, and in this chapter we learn she was also associated with Arameans:

Genesis 25:19-20, NIV This is the account of Abraham’s son Isaac. Abraham became the father of Isaac, and Isaac was forty years old when he married Rebekah daughter of Bethuel the Aramean from Paddan Aram and sister of Laban the Aramean.

So apparently, Rebekah was from Ur, since Eliezer was sent to Abraham’s place of birth to find a wife for Isaac, the town of Nahor (Gen 24:10), and is also an Aramean. This is starting to get confusing!

According to more scientific, non-biblical sources, the Arameans (or Aramaean) were a confederacy of tribes that spoke a northern Semitic language (Aramaic) and, between the 11^th and 8^th century BCE, occupied Aram, a large area in northern Syria. Some of these tribes also conquered large regions in Mesopotamia during the same time period.

Isaac and Rebekah also struggled with infertility, like Isaac’s parents, and relied on God’s interference in order to have a child. Rebekah eventually became pregnant with twins, and readers once again have pre-destination thrown at them. Before Rebekah’s twins are even born, God dooms the elder one (Esau) in favor of the younger twin (Jacob).

Genesis 25:23, NIV The Lord said to her, “Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you will be separated; one people will be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger.”

The boys were born, Esau and Jacob. Esau was named for his red hair, and Jacob for the fact that he was holding Esau’s heel when he emerged from the womb. The name Jacob literally means “heel holder”, and in later times also came to mean “supplanter”. Isaac favored Esau, and Rebekah favored Jacob. Once again, the choosing of favorites is perfectly fine! It’s nice to see that dysfunctional families have such a long, storied history.

This chapter ends with yet another confusing tale. Esau, the hunter, returns “from the open country”, starving. Jacob just so happens to be cooking some stew (I thought that would be a job for the slaves?). Instead of being a nice brother, and offering Esau a meal with no strings attached, Jacob decides to take advantage of the situation. He bribes Esau, demanding that he forego his birthright, before he will give him any food. Esau (did I mention that he was starving), consents. Jacob is a jerk.

Isaac marries Rebekah

Genesis 24

This chapter starts out with an interesting ancient Israelite custom:

Genesis 24:2, NIV He said to the chief servant in his household, the one in charge of all that he had, “Put your hand under my thigh. I want you to swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and the God of earth, that you will not get a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I am living, but will go to my country and my own relatives and get a wife for my son Isaac.”

It was a fairly common practice in the ancient Near East to hold on to a man’s testicles as a way of sealing the deal on a sacred oath between two men. If Abraham died, Eliezer was still bound by his oath.

The story of the match made between Rebekah and Isaac was always one of my favorites in the Bible, and it still is. This is definitely the best story I have read so far on this journey to read the Bible, front to back.

As interesting as Rebekah is to this feminist, I found Abraham’s instructions to Eliezer enlightening as well. First of all, Isaac’s wife must absolutely NOT be a Canaanite. The second restriction was that Isaac could not settle in Nahor, Rebekah’s homeland. It was crucial that Isaac remained in Canaan, the land promised by God to Abraham. I guess Abraham figures that if Isaac moves away, he would forget God’s promise and lose the drive to claim Canaan for his descendants. 

Genesis 24:66-67, NIV Then the servant told Isaac all he had done. Isaac brought her into the tent of his mother Sarah, and he married Rebekah. So she became his wife, and he loved her; and Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death.

This is one of the first times I have been struck by the humanity in the story. This chapter is well written; and the reader can really relate to how Isaac is feeling, in what sounds like the time period shortly after his mother’s death. True or not, great storytelling happens in this chapter.dfgiadhf

The Death of Sarah

The Cave of Machpelah (Cave of the Patriarchs), the supposed resting place
of Sarah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Rebecca, and Leah. 

Genesis 23

Genesis 23:1-2, NIV Sarah lived to be a hundred and twenty-seven years old. She died at Kiriath Arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan, and Abraham went to mourn for Sarah and to weep over her.

In the last chapter, we learn that Abraham settles in Beersheba after he is tested by God. So why do the husband and wife pair live apart, with Sarah residing in Hebron? It is unclear as to if they ever reunited after Abraham took Isaac away to offer him as a sacrifice. I could definitely see how that action might result in a marital rift.

Ironically, most of this chapter is spent on the bartering that took place between Abraham and the Hittites, rather than any particular grief over Sarah’s death. Abraham negotiates to buy a tomb for her, and the sidebar in my NIV Student Bible describes the scenario aptly:

“This may be the oldest recorded business deal. The elaborate politeness sounds very much like bargaining in the Middle East today. Underneath the smooth words, shrewd negotiating is going on.”

What is interesting to note here, is the reference to Hittites. The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who established a kingdom in what is now Turkey and northern Syria, in the 18^th BCE. This would be long after Abraham is presumed to have lived, if the story is based on a real person. The very first indication of their existence in ancient texts occurs around 1900 BCE. Either the Hittites of the Torah are a different group of people, or it is another contradiction in Genesis of how Biblical stories don’t line up with the historical and archaeological record.

This chapter also contains both the first account of a burial in the Bible, and the first commercial transaction.

Herod the Great is the one to have built the large, rectangular enclosure pictured above over the caves that are presumed to be the final resting place of both Sarah and Abraham, as well as some of their descendants.